“World’s Smallest Car” Takes a Spin

(CBS) Some cars are a tight fit, but this car may have you thinking about clowns.

Touted as “The World’s Smallest Car,” the Peel Trident is a 150-pound miniature auto marvel that is completely electric and has no carbon emissions.

The two-seat battery-powered mini-car can reach a speed of 40 miles an hour but cannot go in reverse. Two hundred of them can be parked on a New York City block.

But they’re not street-legal in the United States — yet.

Dave Price, The Early Show’s weather anchor, however, got an exclusive chance on Thursday to drive one of these tiny cars, which will soon be added to the Ripley’s Believe It Or Not Times Square collection.

“I feel like I’m one of the Jetson’s,” Price said of the vehicle which sells for $20,000 to $25,000. “…I gotta tell ya, it drives like a dream.”

Michael Hirsch, general manager of Ripleys Believe it or Not Times Square, is interested in the possibilities for making the cars available in the United States.

“We have the potential to solve all of New York’s street problems,” Hirsch said.

The cars were originally conceived in the ’60s in London, where they are street-legal. The Peel cars currently hold the Guinness World Record for being the smallest car ever mass-produced.